State of the Nations' Foster Care 2024

About the survey

The 2024 State of the Nations' Foster Care survey was open from 2 May to 14 July 2024. It was completed by over 3,000 current and former foster carers and 114 fostering services across the UK.

86% of the foster carer respondents were mainstream foster carers and 14% were approved family and friends/ kinship foster carers (or pending approval).

The survey explored different stages of the foster carer's journey from recruitment, application and approval, to resignation or retirement. It looked at aspects of fostering including training, status, support, and finances. The services' survey also explored systemic issues such as shortages of foster carers and experiences of sufficiency planning.

Read the report

Read the 2024 summary report

Read the 2024 full report

You can also find out more about the history of the survey and read our previous reports here.

Key findings from the 2024 survey

Recruitment

• The top motivation to foster remained the same as in 2021: to make a difference to the lives of children in care.
• The most common reasons services named as preventing suitable applicants from enquiring to foster were finances, perceptions about fostering or children in foster care, and a lack of space in the home.

Matching

• Only three in five foster carers surveyed felt they had time to plan before the child they were most recently matched with moved in, down from over four in five in 2021.
• Only half of foster carers said they were given all the information they needed to care for the child they were most recently matched with.
• Only a third said the child was given enough information about them, or was able to visit their home, before moving in.

Learning and development

• Just over half of foster carers said they had an annual L&D plan, down from two thirds in 2021.
• 67% rated their pre-approval training as excellent or good, and 63% rated their post-approval training as such, down from 71% for L&D overall in 2021.
• In comments on training they want but cannot access, foster carers most frequently asked for changes to the timing, format or level of training. The most common specific area of training requested was therapeutic care.
• Almost three quarters of foster carers and fostering services said they think there should be a standardised accredited framework for pre- and post-approval training for foster carers.

Family time

• Less than two thirds of foster carers said they feel supported by their service in relation to children's time with their birth family.
• Three in five foster carers said they feel current arrangements for family time are in the best interests of the children they foster.

Day-to-day decisions

• Less than a third of foster carers said children's social workers are always clear about which decisions they have the authority to make in relation to the children they foster.
• Foster carers felt more able to make these decisions in relation to children they foster long-term than short-term, but both have decreased since 2021.
• Half of foster carers said social workers respond to requests for decisions in a timely manner.

Status of foster carers

• Foster carers felt most valued by health professionals and supervising social workers, and least valued by children's social workers.
• Over a third of foster carers felt they have no rights or protections in their role, and a quarter said they don't have many. The top rights and protections foster carers wanted related to their conditions/ treatment (including being treated as professionals), allegations, and finances.

Support for foster carers

• Three quarters of foster carers rated support from their supervising social worker as excellent or good, as in 2021.
• Just over a third rated out of hours support as excellent or good, down from 43% in 2021.
• Less than half of foster carers said they have access to an approved support network/ person who can provide overnight care for the children they foster.
• Almost three in five foster carers have experienced burnout or poor wellbeing because of their fostering role.
• Mockingbird foster carers rated support more highly, were more likely to have access to an approved support network/ person to provide overnight care, and were less likely to have experienced burnout or poor wellbeing because of their fostering.

Support for children in foster care

• Half of foster carers said at least one child they foster receives additional support with their learning, but only half of these said they think this additional support is sufficient.
• 45% said at least one child they foster is either receiving mental health or wellbeing support or is on a waiting list for support.
• Two in five foster carers said they are fostering a child who needs mental health support but isn't getting it, up from a third in 2021.

Allegations

• Just over a third of foster carers who reported experiencing an allegation/s within the previous 24 months said they received independent support in relation to their most recent allegation. Less than one in ten said they received specialist counselling support, and less than one in ten said their wider family was offered support by their fostering service.
• Over a third of foster carers commented that allegations had affected their experiences of fostering, including feelings about fostering, fear of allegations, relationships with services, and confidence as a foster carer. A quarter commented that allegations had impacted their mental health.

Finances

• Only one in three foster carers said the fostering allowance, and any expenses they can claim, meet the full costs of looking after the children they foster, down from over half in 2021.
• Only a quarter of foster carers said they feel their fee is sufficient to cover their essential living costs.
• Two thirds of foster carers and fostering services said governments should each set a national fee framework to apply across all fostering services.

Endings and post-foster care

Children moving on in foster care

• Two thirds of foster carers who have experienced a child moving on from them in the past 24 months said this included an unplanned ending, up from 45% in 2021. The top reason for unplanned endings was foster carers' own request. Comments from foster carers and fostering services showed that this was often due to a lack of support for foster carers.
• Two thirds of foster carers who have experienced a planned ending for a child in their care in the past 24 months said their latest planned ending was preceded by a child's care plan review, a looked after child review or a children's hearing. Four in five said they were involved in this review. Just over half were given the opportunity to feed into the referral information for the child's next care arrangement.
• Half of foster carers reported feeling decisions to move children are always or usually in children's best interests, up from a third in 2021.

 

Post-foster care

• The top reason foster carers said eligible young people didn't stay in post-foster care was because they did not want to.
• Three quarters of foster carers said they are worse off financially as a result of offering post-foster care.

 

Keeping in touch

• Less than half of foster carers said they always or usually keep in touch with children they have previously fostered.
• The most common reasons for not keeping in touch were that local practice didn't allow it, the child's birth family or adopters didn't want them to keep in touch with their former foster carers, or the child themselves didn't want to keep in touch.

Retention and sufficiency planning

• All but one fostering service reported a shortage of foster carers to care for children in their local population.
• Three in five foster carers said they have considered or are considering resigning from fostering, most commonly due to a lack of support from their fostering service, a lack of respect from other professionals, or burnout or poor wellbeing related to fostering.
• Less than half of fostering services said they are always or usually involved in local or regional sufficiency planning for looked after children.
• Two thirds of services agreed with proposals to create a national fostering recruitment and retention strategy in each nation of the UK.

Views and attitudes on fostering

• Less than half of foster carers said they would recommend fostering, down from just over half in 2021.
• The top three things foster carers said work well in fostering were positive relationships with social workers, the fostering community, and the impact of fostering on children and young people. The top three things services said work well were support for foster carers, their own practice and processes, and the impact of fostering on children and young people.
• The top three things foster carers said they wanted to see changed to make foster care better were finances, their status and respect in the team around the child, and support for them and children in care. The top three things fostering services said they wanted to see changed were finances, aspects of the fostering system including matching, and foster carers' status and respect in the team around the child.

Key recommendations

Our key recommendations for governments include to:

• Create a national recruitment campaign, framework for pre- and post-approval training, and register for foster carers in each nation of the UK
• Increase financial support for foster carers, including through a national fee framework, pension scheme, and increased allowances
• Introduce statutory 'opt-out' maximum delegated authority for foster carers to make decisions on behalf of children and young people in their care
• Invest in increased support for children in care and foster carers, including mental health and wellbeing support
• Extend the upper age limit for foster care to age 25 to improve transitions to independence for young people
• Fund innovative programmes including Mockingbird and Step Up Step Down

Read the summary report for an overview of our recommendations for governments, placing authorities and fostering services, or see the full report for a complete list of recommendations.

What next?

We launched the 2024 State of the Nations report on 11 February 2025, at an event hosted by Josh MacAlister MP in the Houses of Parliament, Westminster.

We were delighted to be joined by around 200 guests, including our members and representatives from the charity sector and national and local governments. We heard from the Children's Minister, comedian and foster carer Kiri Pritchard-McLean, care experienced author Rowan Aderyn, and a panel of MPs.

As our CEO, Sarah Thomas, said at the launch event, we will take every opportunity to campaign for governments to take forward the recommendations from our research. We will also support and influence services to deliver change at a local level.

To stay up to date with our latest campaigns activity and to get involved, join our campaigns email list here.

If you want to get in touch with our policy team about anything from this page, please email policy@fostering.net.